


To Take Me Safe and Sound

by DahliaFey (orphan_account)



Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, First Kiss, Rating May Change, Romance, Thieves Guild Questline (Elder Scrolls)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-04
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:14:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26291695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/DahliaFey
Summary: Wasn’t it past time they stopped dancing around one another? She needed him like roses needed rain, like birds needed the blue sky.
Relationships: Brynjolf/Female Dovahkiin | Dragonborn
Kudos: 24





	To Take Me Safe and Sound

Morgan found Brynjolf where she least expected to; sitting on the edge of her balcony at Honeyside, his legs dangling over the sunset-stained waters of Lake Honrich.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you! Why are you up here, of all places?”

“Sorry, lass.” He turned to look at her over his shoulder, his face drawn in melancholy. “This place sat empty for so long, I used to come up here to think. Don’t worry, I’ll leave you to it.”

“Not so fast. I said I was looking for you, didn’t I?” She moved to sit beside him, slotting her legs through the balcony bars so her feet swung alongside his. Her pack rested at her side, and she rummaged through it until she emerged with a bottle of Black-Briar Mead in each hand. “Here, you look like you need a drink.”

“Aye, it’s been one of those days.” He took the offered bottle and uncorked it with his teeth, spitting the cork out where it landed in the lake below with a plunk.

They clinked the necks of their bottles together, sitting back to enjoy the companionable silence while they drank. The cool evening breeze lifted the ends of Brynjolf’s fiery hair where it spilled over his broad shoulders, and the trees rustled in all their autumnal finery. Morgan was loathe to ruin the moment, but she’d come here for a reason, after all.

“I’m riding out at dawn to meet Mercer up north in some miserable old tomb. We’re going after this ‘Karliah.’”

“So I hear.” He didn’t look at her, his stormy eyes fixed dead ahead.

“And that upsets you?”

He scoffed. “I’m not upset, it just doesn’t make any sense. Why choose you as his second?”

She couldn’t help the raising of her eyebrows. “You don’t think I’ll make a good second?”

“I’m not doubting your abilities, lass.” He spared her a glance out of the corner of his eye. “But you weren’t there when it all happened. You never knew Gallus or Karliah, you never knew what was lost that day.”

“That’s hardly my fault. It was twenty years ago; I was still in pigtails and skinned knees!”

He smiled then, warm and soft and wistful. “I was only a boy, myself.”

“Will you tell me about Karliah?” she said.

He heaved a great sigh. “There’s not much I can tell that you don’t already know. I never knew the real Karliah, never imagined she could have hurt Gallus, and we’ve all been picking up the pieces of her deception ever since. Or trying to, anyway.”

“What about her fighting style? Weapons, techniques, that sort of thing. I should know something about the woman I’ll be facing.”

“You won’t be facing her; Mercer will. He’s the best damn duellist I’ve ever seen, so you just make sure to watch his back and you’ll be fine.”

“I will, Brynjolf. I swear it.”

“Well, you’ve not disappointed me yet. If I can’t go myself, there’s no one else I trust more than you.”

She swallowed down the unnameable emotion that welled within her at his words, and bumped her leather-clad shoulder to his own. “Gallus will be avenged,” she murmured. “The guild will be avenged.”

“Aye.” He reached down between them and took up her hand, his calloused fingers rough against hers. “I know it.”

She squeezed his hand, looking away so he wouldn’t see her pleased smile and pink cheeks, and neither of them spoke for a few moments more, content to just be together in the dwindling daylight.

They weren’t the only ones. Two shadowy figures walked the path from Riften’s stables down to the edge of the lake, a man and a woman, and when the woman lowed her hood, her shock of golden hair was recognisable in an instant.

“It’s Haelga,” Morgan whispered, “and who’s that she’s with?”

“My septims are on Bolli. They’re the worst kept secret in Skyrim.” The two of them drew their legs back up onto the balcony, out of sight from the lovers below.

“Are you blind? That’s no Nord. An Imperial at most, maybe even a Breton.”

“You’re right. Maybe it’s—”

Haelga’s diminutive companion removed his hood and cloak, revealing himself to be Aerin, Mjoll the Lioness’ (not so) stalwart companion.

Morgan and Brynjolf stifled their laughter, shoulders jumping as they struggled to stay quiet to not disturb the unlikely couple undressing at the lake’s brim. Morgan could scarce contain her sniggering when Haelga ushered a seemingly reluctant Aerin into the water, their pale, naked bodies bright even in the dusky gloom.

“Nice night for it, I suppose,” Morgan said, grinning.

Brynjolf squinted down at them as they became entangled in a lover’s embrace. “Bit cold, by the looks of it.”

She couldn’t take it anymore; great, squawking laughter rose from her chest, loud and echoing across the lake. Seeing her face, Brynjolf joined her, guffawing with such unabashed glee that it warmed her soul to hear it.

“Who’s there?” Haelga called out, the implied threat evident in her voice.

Fists jammed into their mouths, Morgan and Brynjolf scooted back from the edge of the balcony, listening and waiting.

“Damn it, Haelga, I told you it was too risky!” Water splashed beneath them as Aerin stomped back to shore. “Why couldn’t we have just done it at my place like last time?”

“Lady Dibella demands variety! You’d have me deny her?”

“Come on, lass,” Brynjolf whispered to Morgan, mirth still crinkling in the corners of his eyes. “Let’s go inside.”

“Right.” She jumped to her feet and opened the door to her home, warmth and light hitting the both of them as they came in from the chilly air.

“I should get back to the Flagon,” Brynjolf said, although he did not move any closer towards the exit. “Someone has to take control of the rabble while Mercer’s away.”

“All right. I’m going to stay here and get some sleep. Lots of avenging to do tomorrow.” As she said this, Brynjolf’s eyes darted down to the grand bed before them, then back up to meet hers, so quick she almost missed it.

The corner of his mouth quirked up, caught but unrepentant, and his eyes glimmered with promise.

She stepped into his space, remembering her other reason for seeking him out in the first place. Wasn’t it past time they stopped dancing around one another?

There was a deep gouge in Brynjolf’s black armour by his shoulder, the leather peeling away a little from past trauma. Before she knew it, she was tracing the line with her fingers.

“I think about you all the time,” she whispered.

He took her in his arms, his hands strong about her waist, but said nothing.

“Since I won’t see you before I leave, let me say goodbye now.” She leaned up to press a kiss to his stubbled cheek.

Quick as a cat, one of his hands wrapped around the back of her neck, turning her face to kiss him full on the mouth. She made a little surprised sound in her throat, but melted into the honey-sweet of his lips all the same. Her fingers clutched the worn straps of his cuirass, while her other hand tangled in his long hair, and she kissed him with all the pent-up longing of months of being able to look but not touch.

She needed him like roses needed rain, like birds needed the blue sky, and her heart, sensing the proximity of his own, pumped ever faster. His kiss consumed her like fire immolating timber, and all too quickly he pulled away, his eyes intense as he looked down at her.

“I can’t stay,” he said. “Mercer would kill us both.”

She groaned, thumping her head into his shoulder, her arms wrapping around his middle. She finally had him, only to be wrenched apart by bad timing and circumstance. “You’re right and I hate it.”

“Chin up, lass.” He chuckled. “And make sure you come back to me in one piece. I’ll be waiting for you.”

She looked up at him, letting him know with her expression just how disgruntled she was at the situation. “You’d better.”

He stroked a hand down her side, frowning when his fingers found a gaping hole in her travel cloak. “You should get this patched up,” he said, fiddling with the tear. “It won’t keep you warm in the winter.”

She smiled at him, impish. “Maybe by the time winter gets here, I’ll have found something else to keep me warm at night.”

His eyes smouldered. “Aye. Maybe you will.”


End file.
